If You Ever Need Help
by Menthol Pixie
Summary: "The card read; If you ever need help..." Gloria thought that yes, she might need some help. Outsider POV. Sequel to Drawing A Blank.
1. Chapter 1

** If You Ever Need Help**

**A/N: I'm a little worried about how this one will go over really. I guess it's a bit more Gloria-oriented than Sam and Dean, although there's still plenty of our boys. It's two chapters long, the second containing most of the excitement, so I guess I'm just asking you guys to give it a chance before immediately discarding it. (Okay, maybe I'm more than a _little _worried...)**

**In other news, to anyone who's been following, the men who robbed me went to court to be sentenced yesterday (charges are home invasion and aggravated robbery) so I'm just waiting on an email from Victim Support to tell me how it went. Hopefully this whole thing will be over soon. *-fingers crossed-* **

** Chapter One**

Gloria stood in her kitchen indecisively. She fingered the tattered business card. There had been many times in the last six months that she had taken it out, wondering. Once, she'd almost finished dialling the number printed on it before she lost her nerve and hung up.

Now she wasn't sure what to do. The message read, _If you ever need help_, and she thought that yes, she might need some help, but maybe the help she needed was some kind of anti-psychotic drug – like her eldest son seemed to be suggesting – or maybe she just needed a cat, like her youngest son thought.

"You're just going a bit mad in that empty old house," he'd laughed when she told him of the strange goings-on. "Get a cat or something. Go out, meet some people. You shouldn't be alone so much."

"Come and stay. Just for a week. Bring the kids, there's plenty of room."

"Oh, Mum, you know what my job's like."

Gloria didn't, not really, because the only conversations she had with him were over the phone and they always ended within ten minutes with some flimsy excuse.

"Got to go, Mum, I think the dog's trying to eat the hose again."

Gloria didn't want a cat to molt all over her carpets and scratch up her furniture, and she didn't want to be medicated. She just wanted her bedroom to stop being so cold, and to stop waking up in the night with the fearful sense that she wasn't alone.

Honestly, she'd started sleeping on the couch in front of the TV. It played havic on her back and gave way to the upsetting realization that she was simply too old to not have a mattress underneath her.

She'd never had a problem with living alone before. Sure, she sometimes missed the chatter of people around her, but she had always found comfort in being at home. She had her soaps to watch and she enjoyed knitting things for the grandkids. Secretly, she had a lot of fun sometimes, dancing around to the boppy songs on the radio as she vacummed or tidied, in a manner completely unbecoming for a woman of her age, but there was no one around to laugh at her. She'd certainly never felt afraid, but now the atmosphere in her house was changing, darkening into something threatening. She found herself taking extra shifts at the hospital as an excuse to stay away for longer. She began to dread going home.

And then, two days ago, she fell down the stairs. She landed at the bottom, a bit bruised, a lot shaken, and with the firm belief that someone had pushed her. She knew this, just as she knew that there was no one else in the house. She also knew that this was a contradiction, but that didn't stop it from being true.

She _wasn't _just a loopy old lady – God, she wasn't even that old – she wasn't losing her marbles. There was something happening in her house.

"You're imagining things, Mum," her eldest informed her helpfully. "Maybe you need your hearing and eyesight checked. Or perhaps you should go to the doctor, tell him some of the things you've told me..."

Her hearing and eyesight were fine, thank you very much, and, oh, don't worry, the trip down the stairs hadn't left any lasting damage, nice of you to ask, and would you like to come for dinner? Oh, you're busy. Maybe next week? Some other time then. Have a nice – _click_.

Maybe she was being too harsh. Her sons meant well, she knew, but they were busy with their own lives, their own jobs and kids, and simply didn't have time for her problems.

Gloria flipped the business card over.

_If you ever need help._

She looked from the card to the phone. He probably didn't even remember her. He probably had even less time for her than her sons did. He probably wouldn't come.

She dialled the number. Maybe he wouldn't even pick up. He probably had a different phone now, a different number. Kids these days were always upgrading to the latest model. He was a mystery from the past, the kind that never got solved.

_"Hello?"_

The voice offered nothing else, no name to confirm that she had the right person, and... it sounded off, not like she remembered it. She almost hung up right then, but she'd come this far.

"Um, is this... I mean, I'm looking for Sam?"

_"Hang on,"_ the voice said, and it clicked into place. Dean, the brother. She did have the right number. She heard the phone being fumbled with and listened in as Dean, in the background now, made a crack about it being a girl – she wasn't sure if she should be insulted or flattered – and then a new voice came on the line.

_"Hello?"_

Gloria's heart was beating faster than it should have. Sometimes it had been all too easy to convince herself that she'd made him up, despite the business card. There was something unreal about their meeting and he had vanished so suddenly. A few times she'd even looked up his case on the hospital computers, to reassure herself that he really had been there. She was fairly certain that the last name on the files was fake and the insurance Dean had given had been dodgy, but it hadn't tarnished her opinion of the boy at all.

"Sam?"

There was a beat of silence as he tried to place her voice and Gloria felt her hopes dim. Of course he wouldn't remember her, she was just a nurse who had looked after him for a couple of weeks, just a blip in his busy life, just -

"_Gloria?"_

"Yes." He did remember her!

"_Are you alright? Has something happened?"_

He sounded genuinely concerned, which melted something inside her and she felt a bit more confident as she stammered into the phone.

"No. Well, yes." Which question was she meant to be answering? "I'm okay, but... I think I need some help."

XXX

He looked almost the same as she remembered. Of course, his hair had grown out over where his stitches had been and he looked a great deal healthier and less bruised than he had the last time she'd seen him at the hospital, but it was him alright.

Sam and his brother sat in her living room, and that in itself amazed Gloria. She honestly hadn't thought she would ever see either of them again. They both accepted her offer of coffee – she used the private moment as she brewed it in the kitchen to pinch herself - and she brought each of them a cup, making a tea for herself before sitting down awkwardly in her chair.

It wasn't like the last time they had been together, when Sam was her patient and she was his nurse, and despite the reassurances offered over the phone, she was about to tell them a ridiculous story that in the light of day didn't seem the slightest bit believable. She felt like a foolish old woman.

"So tell us whats been happening," Sam encouraged, his coffee sitting untouched on the table as he gazed at her with what she thought was the same amazement that must have been in her eyes. Neither had expected to see the other again.

Gloria sighed, "It sounds crazy. Maybe it is. I'm sorry I dragged you both out here, but I didn't know who else to call."

"It's no trouble, really," Sam assured her quickly, "And we kind of specialize in crazy."

Gloria wasn't sure she wanted to know what that meant, and Sam and Dean were looking at her expectantly so, reluctantly, she told them her story.

It had started a month ago, maybe a little longer, and it had started in her bedroom. It wasn't a large room and it had always warmed up quickly when the sun came through the windows and stayed warm all day through but soon even running a heater in there didn't help. It stayed cold, and not just cold. Icy, almost. A few times she'd even seen her breath steam in the air.

She started seeing things out of the corner of her eye, things that were never there when she looked properly, and the radio stopped working at night. She could only get static. Sometimes the TV flickered and occasionally she thought she heard a voice muttering. Then there was the fall down the stairs that hadn't been accidental at all. She'd_ felt _hands on her.

When Gloria finished the brothers exchanged a quick, knowing glance before turning their attention back to her.

Dean cleared his throat awkwardly, "Is there anyone who might hold a grudge against you? Someone with a reason to target you?"

Gloria frowned, "I don't think you understand. There was no one in the house when I was pushed down the stairs. I always lock my door and windows. I was alone."

"I meant someone who's dead," Dean said bluntly. Sam shot him a disapproving look.

"You think it's a ghost?" Gloria asked.

"I know it's hard to believe," Sam started, "But-"

Gloria shook her head, a huff of a laugh escaping her lips, "No, no, I believe it. I just didn't think anyone else would."

"Oh," Sam said, looking slightly dumbfounded, "Well, that makes things easier."

"Anyone, Gloria?" Dean pressed.

Gloria was quiet, thinking. She sipped her tea without tasting it.

"Maybe it's the house," Dean suggested, to Sam more than her, "We'll have to do some research."

"No." Gloria held up a hand, not quite able to meet the boy's eyes. "There is someone."

Now that she had thought of it, the answer seemed clear. She was surprised she hadn't figured it out before.

"He always said he'd find me," she murmered to herself.

"Who?" Sam prodded gently, "Who said he'd find you, Gloria?"

Gloria placed her cup of tea down on the table, gathering herself together. "It's not something that I talk about," she said carefully. "It was a long time ago now."

Sam and Dean gave her a moment but she knew what was coming.

"We need to know, really. We wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."

Gloria stared down into her tea cup. "I was married once," she began, "I thought I was in love, but I was young and Paul was handome and I was impressionable, I suppose. We were happy, for a while. He was the father of my two sons. The boys were still little when things went wrong."

She paused to sip her lukewarm tea, and this time neither brother spoke. She continued under her own steam.

"Paul lost his job, and couldn't find a new one. He used to drink before that, but after... he changed. He drank all the time, and he got angry. Angry if the dishes weren't done or the boys weren't in bed on time. Angry at everything really. And then he started hitting me."

"I'm sorry," Sam's voice said quietly.

Gloria flapped a hand in his direction. "Not your fault," she said, annoyed at the huskiness in her own voice. "Anyway, he'd hit me and I'd tell him I was taking the kids and leaving. He'd say not to bother because he'd find me and bring me back. So I stayed, for another two years. My oldest was five by then, the youngest almost three. I could handle Paul knocking me around but I always told myself that if he laid a hand on the boys, I'd leave. One day it happened, so I packed up myself and the kids and left. I never saw Paul again. I heard he hung himself a few years later."

The atmosphere in her living room was thick and awkward. Gloria dabbed at the corners of her eyes surrepticiously and cleared her throat. "So that's my sob story," she said, trying to sound flippant, "I wouldn't be surprised if Paul kept his word. The weird stuff starts when it gets dark."

Luckily, the boys could take a hint and went on without any clumsy attempts at comforting her.

"What was Paul's last name?" Dean asked.

"Daniells. Paul Daniells. His middle name was Robert, if that helps."

"It does," Sam said. "Okay, so we'll hang around here, wait until dark and see if we can get confirmation that Paul's our guy. Is there someone you can stay with until this is over?"

There wasn't. Gloria was friendly with most of the other nurses at work but not the kind of friendly where she could just show up on one of their doorsteps, and the gossip it would cause! The younger nurses were the worst; oh, so and so's pregnant, and Linda's cheating on her boyfriend and Carrie's sleeping with one of the doctors. Sometimes she felt like she was on the set of _Greys Anatomy_ rather than working in a busy hospital. Gloria was saved from having to admit her lack of friends when Dean spoke.

"If it's Paul, it's not tied to the house. It's tied to her. It'll just follow."

Sam didn't look happy but conceded the point, "Okay then, so we all stay here and wait for the ghost to show up."

"So a pretty normal evening, then," Dean said, reaching for her TV remote.

Gloria didn't think he was joking.

XXX

Sam was clicking away on his laptop in the living room, trying to find out where Paul was buried, apparently, and Gloria was in the kitchen, rustling up some dinner for the three of them, when Dean appeared in the doorway. He stood there awkwardly until Gloria took pity on him.

"Here, you can set the table," she said, handing him a stack of cutlery.

Seeming relieved to be given sometimes to do, Dean obeyed, moving to the small dining room that connected to the kitchen.

"You don't have to cook for us, you know," he said as he laid down knives and forks, "I saw a diner not far from here."

"I don't mind in the slightest." Gloria had the feeling that the boys were far overdue a good home-cooked meal and honestly, she wouldn't eat at the diner down the road if they paid her. "You and Sam are doing me a big favour. It's the least I can do to repay you."

"Seems to me like we owe you a favour." Dean looked up from the table, "I, uh, never really got to thank you, for looking after Sam for me."

"I was his nurse," Gloria said to the oven so that he wouldn't see her blush. "It was my job."

"The way Sam talks about you, it seems you went above and beyond the call of duty."

"Well, someone had to be there for him." Less than two seconds after the words were out of her mouth she realised how they sounded. She spun to face Dean. "I didn't mean, uh, not that you-"

"It's okay." Dean didn't look like it was okay. "I'm really happy that there was someone looking out for him, when I wasn't there."

Gloria wrestled with herself for a moment, wondering if she was overstepping the boundaries but couldn't help asking.

"Where were you?" It came out a bit blunter than she meant it to. "I mean, it got to the point where I didn't think anyone was going to come. What held you up?"

Dean's face darkened, his eyes turned hard and Gloria actually took a step back, he was so intimidating.

"I thought he was dead," he said, his voice so low that Gloria wasn't sure she'd heard him right.

"What?" she asked breathlessly.

Dean was gripping the back of one of her chairs hard enough that his knuckles were white. "I thought he was dead. A de- something told me that he was dead. I was hunting it." He glanced up at Gloria and this time she caught a glimpse of the devastation he must have felt. "It took me a while to track it down and I... well, eventually it told me it had lied, so I took care of it and started searching the hospitals."

Gloria recalled the battered man that had shown up in her hospital.

"It was a demon?"

Dean frowned, "Man, how are you so accepting of all this stuff? We come in talking about ghosts and demons and you just nod your head like it's the most normal thing in the world. Most people think we're nuts."

Gloria took that for a yes. "Before Sam remembered anything, he had this notebook that one of the doctors gave him. He was supposed to write in it so it would jog his memory."

"I know the one," Dean said, still frowning.

"I read it once."

"You _read_ it?" Dean sounded doubtful.

"Okay, I didn't actually _read_ it, but I looked through it. Sam said the Latin was exorcisms."

"And you believed him?" Dean shook his head, looking at her like she was something he just couldn't understand.

"He was very sincere."

"He'd just suffered a serious head injury," Dean pointed out.

Gloria shrugged.

Dean huffed a laugh through his nose. "Anyway, I think_ thanks_ was the point of this conversation."

"Don't thank me," Gloria instructed, "Just get that ghost out of my house."

XXX

Just after 8 o'clock the TV flickered.

Gloria looked to Sam. Sam looked to Dean, who nodded and bent to unzip the duffle bag beside his chair.

Gloria turned apprehensively to gaze at the staircase leading to the bedrooms. Something was up there, something that might be Paul, come back from the grave to punish her for leaving all those years ago. She shuddered at the thought and turned back to ask what exactly Sam and Dean planned to do. The words died in her mouth.

Standing in the middle of her nice, tidy living room, looking completely out of place, Sam was checking rounds in a shotgun. Dean held a similar gun at his side as he turned on the radio. Static filled Gloria's ears and she was struck by the stupidity of inviting two strangers, young, strong men who could easily overpower her, into her house.

God, she didn't really know either of them. All she had was a couple of weeks in the hospital when Sam didn't even know himself. Suppose his memories came back and he'd discovered that he and his brother were criminals?

"It's rock salt."

Gloria tore her gaze away from the weapons to Sam's face. He held up his arms non-threateningly, gun pointed toward the wall.

"They aren't real bullets," he explained, seemingly anxious for her to understand, "They're rock salt. Salt's a purity from the earth. It repels spirits."

"A kitchen condiment is going to kill a ghost?" Gloria asked, feeling a little faint.

"Not kill," Dean corrected, turning off the radio. "Just... it'll go away for a while."

"Okay..."

"Stay here," Sam said.

Gloria raised her eyebrows and made a snap decision that she'd rather trust Sam and Dean than live with her dead ex-husband. "You think I'm staying down here by myself while there's a ghost in the house? I'm coming with you."

Sam chewed on his bottom lip. Gloria did her best to look determined and finally Sam gave in.

"Just... stay behind us then."

"That I can do."

Catiously, holding the railing firmly, Gloria followed the two brothers up the stairs. Once at the top they carried on along the hallway until they reached the end room. Gloria's room.

Using hand signals that baffled Gloria, the boys got into position. Sam stepped in front of her, shotgun held ready, and Dean stood by the door, hand on the knob. His quick eyes flashed over them and, assured that they were all ready – though Gloria wasn't sure what she was meant to be ready for – turned the knob and pushed the door open in one smooth movement.

A gust of icy air washed out of the doorway but apart from that the room was as it always was. Her bed and matching side tables were against the far wall, in the middle. The window was firmly shut, curtains drawn. The wardrobe was empty, the door open. She'd moved most of her clothes into her youngest son's old bedroom, eager to spend as little time in her room as possible.

The radio on the bedside table turned on by itself, static screeching.

"Have you ever seen it?" Dean asked, voice low.

"Sometimes I catch a glimpse of something in the corner of my eye," Gloria said, her own voice hushed.

"Maybe it's not strong enough to physically manifest yet," Sam suggested.

"Thank God for that," Gloris shuddered, and turned back to the stairs.

There, just inches away from her, so close that if he'd been breathing she would have felt it against her skin, stood Paul. His dirty blonde hair was plastered against his head, his eyes bulging and around his neck was a thick black bruise. He raised his hands towards her.

Gloria screamed.

A blast almost deafened her and before her eyes, Paul dissipated into nothing. The radio turned off.

She wanted to keep screaming (because oh my God, she actually just saw a _ghost_, in her own house, and the boys had shot it with _salt_ and this whole situation was just insane) but then Sam was in front of her, taking Paul's place, and he was no where near as fightening.

"Are you okay? Gloria?" he was asking, his hands on her shoulders.

Gloria clamped her mouth shut and, after doing a quick mental check that all her limbs were in place and her bladder had behaved itself, nodded.

"Was that Paul?"

Again, Gloria nodded, not trusting herself to speak just yet.

"Okay, lets go back downstairs," Dean decided, pulling the bedroom door shut.

Sam kept a hand at Gloria's elbow as he guided her down the stairs. She found that it comforted her, and she missed it when he sat her on the couch and disappeared into the kitchen. Dean was putting the guns away. She sat there and watched him in silence.

Sam came back with a mug of tea and pressed it into her hands, before taking a seat next to her.

"Are you sure you're alright?" he asked.

Gloria took a sip of the sweet tea and found that it loosened her vocal cords. "Yes. It just... took me by surprise."

"I'm sorry, you shouldn't have had to see that."

Gloria glanced at Dean, then back at Sam. "Is this really what you do? This is your job?"

Sam hesitated, "I guess you could call it that."

Gloria shook her head, "Why? I mean... God, why?"

"Well, for one thing," Sam placed a hand over her shaking one, steadying the tea cups before she drenched herself, "We get to help people like you."

Gloria felt a small smile form. "Thank you."

"Sam, you wanna go get that other bag of salt from the car? We're gonna need a lot."

Gloria looked up to see Dean pouring salt in a large wonky circle around all the furniture.

Sam patted her shoulder. "I'll be right back."

"He's a nice boy," Gloria said conversationally when Sam was gone.

Dean had his back to her now, tipping a steady stream of white crystals onto the carpet. "He's a pain in the ass," he grumbled lightly, before clearing his throat, "He liked you a lot. He said you were really nice to him in the hospital. I think he saw you as... a substitute mother, or something." He glanced at her, his expression unreadable. "You look a bit like her."

Gloria felt a little warm at that.

"Where are your parents?" she asked without thinking.

Dean's back stiffened, "They're dead."

"I'm sorry," Gloria said. She guessed she should have seen that coming.

"Yeah, well, that's not going to bring them back," Dean muttered.

"No, I suppose it wont," Gloria said mildly.

Dean sighed and when he spoke the bitterness was gone from his voice. "Sorry, that was..."

"No need to apologize, honey. I understand."

Dean looked awkwardly apologetic and quickly turned back to his work. Sam came back with a second bag of salt and they made fast work of fashioning a large ring around the living room.

"We'll stay down here tonight, then we can do a salt and burn tomorrow. You did find out where he's buried, right?"

"Yeah, next county over."

"You can't sleep on the floor," Gloria said as Dean dumped some blankets on the couch for her.

"We probably wont be doing much sleeping."

That night, Gloria slept in her living room, inside a ring of salt, with an armed guard of an old amnesiac patient and his brother, protecting her from her dead ex-husband.

Life was full of surprises.

XXX

**TBC...**


	2. Chapter 2

**If You Ever Need Help**

** Chapter Two**

When Gloria woke in the morning, she could see that Dean had been right; the two brothers looked like they'd barely slept at all. A couple of near-empty coffee cups sat on the floor, Sam's laptop open and plugged into the wall socket (carefully surrounded by salt). She was grateful that the screen was turned away from her, not sure that she wanted to see the kind of things that could be on it.

Dean was dozing lightly in the armchair. When Gloria shifted on the couch his eyes opened, dulled by sleep, appraised her and, as if registering that she was no threat, closed again.

Sam was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the laptop, chewing distractedly on the head of a pen as he scrolled down on the screen.

"Good morning," Gloria said, because that was how she usually greeted people in the morning and she figured it would work just as well in this absurd situation.

Sam's head jerked up and, when the surprise had faded, he smiled at her. "Morning, Gloria. Sleep okay?"

Gloria sat up stiffly, stretching as she tried to work the kinks out of her back and neck. An unbidden fantasy of young hands giving her a massage appeared before she shook it out of her head, amused with herself. "Fine," she lied, "Is it... can I leave the salt circle?"

Sam nodded. "Haven't heard from Paul since last night."

Gloria stepped carefully over the salt and went to the bathroom to shower and change her clothes. The house seemed a lot less threatening in the morning, the dark cloud that settled over it at night dissipating with the sun. It was almost possible to believe that Paul had been nothing more than a bad dream. She felt almost peaceful as she went back to the living area. She found the boys in the kitchen, where the mood was definitely not peaceful.

She entered through the archway just as Sam threw his hands in the air in a classic exasperated motion and, catching sight of her, exclaimed, "Gloria, can you _please_ tell Dean that my head's not going to fall apart the second he leaves me alone?"

"Um," Gloria said, taken aback.

"I don't think your head's going to fall apart," Dean snapped.

"It wont," Gloria said belatedly, still bewildered.

"So what's the problem then?" Sam asked, folding his arms across his chest. "I can handle this."

"The problem," Dean said icily, speaking slowly as if he'd already explained but now needed to dumb it down so that Sam would understand, "Is that you'll be here without any back-up, while I'm too far away to be of any use to anyone. Sam, the last time we split up-"

"Dude, it's a ghost. I have a million rounds of rock salt. And I have Gloria as back-up."

Dean cast her a doubtful glance and Gloria didn't blame him. The only thing she'd ever done to a ghost was scream at it, and that didn't seem to help much.

"We'll take her with us," Dean suggested.

Sam raised an eyebrow.

Dean deflated, "Okay, so that might not work too well, but-"

"But nothing, Dean! You go and take care of the salt and burn and I'll stay here and keep an eye on things."

Gloria wisely kept her mouth shut as, after a tense silent moment, Dean grudgingly backed down, muttering something under his breath as he stalked out of the kitchen.

Sam looked at her awkwardly. "Um, want some tea?"

Gloria accepted, mostly to stop the awkward moment from getting any worse, and took a seat at the table in the dining room. "I'm sorry I'm making things so complicated for you."

Sam laughed humourlessly, "Honestly, this case is so simple it's almost a holiday for us. Dean's just being pig-headed."

Gloria waited until Sam brought her tea through before she spoke. "It sounds to me like he's worried about you."

Sam shrugged, looking off in the direction of Dean's exit. "Yeah, I get that, but he's being over the top. I mean, it's been six months."

"Six months for him to think about how close he came to losing you," Gloria said, thinking back to when her youngest son was five and almost drowned in a swimming pool, the terror that had choked her and how long it had been before she could watch him in the water without the feeling that something awful would happen any minute.

Sam sat in the chair next to her, his hair falling over his eyes, "The job's dangerous. That's a fact, but it's even more dangerous if he's distracted by wondering whether I'm okay or not."

Gloria couldn't dispute that.

"It's just... God, he treats me like a little kid sometimes. He acts like I got hurt because he left me alone for a few minutes, like I can't be trusted by myself. Sometimes stuff just happens."

"Maybe that's what he's afraid of."

Sam was quiet behind his curtain of hair. "I thought we were making progress before, like he was finally starting to see me as my own person, rather than just his kid brother. Then..." Sam shook his head, "I can't go back and stop myself from getting hurt, neither can Dean, but I'm fine now."

"Are you fine?" Gloria asked, "You left the hospital before we could do the tests we usually do."

Sam shrugged, "I guess... sometimes when I'm really tired I start slurring my words, and my balance isn't as steady as it was... but those are hardly life-threatening disabilities."

Gloria sipped her tea. "You were very sick," she informed him, "I don't know if you were told but the doctors didn't think you were going to pull through at first."

"Yeah, Dean's informed me of that," Sam said tightly. "Repeatedly."

"Sorry," Gloria apologized quickly, "I don't mean to sound like I'm taking Dean's side. You seem perfectly capable to me." She swirled her remaining tea nervously. "I don't think I'll make very good back-up though."

XXX

Regardless of what Gloria thought or didn't think, in the afternoon, after a terse, "Be careful," to Sam, Dean climbed into the Impala to begin the long drive to the next county. The two brothers seemed confident that they had the right Paul Daniells and the right burial plot. Gloria didn't ask why they needed to know where he was buried. She wasn't stupid. She'd heard them talking about a 'salt and burn' and she had the feeling she'd mostly figured it out. She just didn't want to think about it, to think about Sam and Dean doing... _that_.

She spent a tense couple of hours, pretending to watch TV. At one point she put on a soap opera that made Sam go still and silent, his eyes fixed on the screen but distant at the same time, as if the show made him think of something very sad. She didn't ask and when the ads came on she changed the channel. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Sam swallow and blink a few times before composing himself.

Eventually, the shadows grew longer and the natural light dimmed. An hour after dark had fully settled, the TV flickered, followed immediately by a crash from the kitchen. It sounded like plates breaking.

Sam had tensed, sitting alert and watchful beside Gloria on the couch, his hand resting on the shotgun at his other side.

"It's left the upstairs. Whatever you do, don't leave the salt circle. We just have to wait it out," he said, his voice low as his eyes continued to flit around the room.

Gloria nodded. She had no intention at all of leaving the circle. She wondered distractedly whether she could keep it there permanantly.

Heavy footsteps stomped on the stairs. There hadn't been a staircase in the home she'd shared with Paul but there had been a few steps leading to the front door. She shuddered as she remembered the daily dread that would chill through her veins when she heard the scuff of his boots on those steps.

"He can't hurt you while you're in here," Sam reassured her.

Gloria jumped as the TV switched to a channel playing black and white snow, buzzing angrily at them. Then the temperature dropped, so suddenly that Gloria's breath caught in her throat. She shivered.

Sam stood, taking the shotgun with him. He turned in a full circle, eyes sharp. The room was deathly still.

"There!" Gloria shrieked suddenly, pointing to the archway leading to the kitchen.

Sam spun, firing off a shot but Paul zapped out of existance before it could connect. Rock salt splattered the wall as Paul reappeared on the other side of the room.

Sam spun again, sighting him up. Paul looked at Gloria and time seemed to slow down as she watched his face split into a menacing grin.

"I found you."

The words hissed in her head. She didn't think he said them aloud. His lips didn't move but she heard him all the same. She couldn't take her eyes off of him. His own eyes, bulging and bloodshot, flicked up above her head and, with another leer, he vanished.

Silence filled the house, punctuated by the buzz from the TV set. The air stayed icy.

"He's still here, isn't he?" Gloria whispered, and had her question answered by a loud bang as a large landscape portrait fell from the wall behind her.

"The salt!" Samm yelled, and Gloria had just enough time to glimpse the scattered crystals before she was yanked off her feet.

She hit the wall with a thud that took her breath away, or maybe that was Paul. He smelt like dirt and whiskey. In life he had been a good-looking man, until near the end when he started to look old and tired, grew a beer-belly and stopped caring about his appearance.

In death, he was truly hidious, made ugly by the evil that was inside him in life and brought to the surface after his demise. His hands were creeping towards her throat. Gloria was frozen. She liked to thing that she was a tough lady; she'd taken self-defense classes so she knew how to protect herself, but she had the feeling that Grab, Squeeze, Twist, Pull wasn't going to work this time.

"Found you..."

Gloria cringed back against the wall, closing her eyes as she wondered how she had ever thought she was in love with this shell of a man.

_Bang!_

Gunshots were louder in real life than on TV, Gloria noted distractedly as she opened her eyes. Paul was gone.

"Fix the circle!" Sam ordered breathlessly, snapping her from her reverie.

Together they grabbed handfuls of salt to pour over the break. Gloria tried to stop the shaking in her hands but it was impossible. Granules of salt spilt everywhere.

"I found you."

Gloria's head snapped up in time to see Sam fly back and slam into the wall, thumping to the floor. She dropped her handful of salt – more accidental than purposeful – and the circle closed.

Paul appeared over Sam's dazed form. His head turned slowly, abnormally on his bruised neck, to look at her. She held his gaze. Sam was reaching for the gun...

Paul was too fast. In a movement too quick to be humanly possible he stomped his foot down on Sam's hand. Gloria heard it crunch.

"Sam!" she cried, hovering uncertainly.

"Stay in the circle!" Sam shot back, trying to get his hand out from under Paul's boot as he gave her a quick glance to make sure she was doing as he said. She was taken aback by the fierce protectiveness she saw in his eyes. Did she really mean that much to him? Had she made that much of an impact? Sure, she had been there when he needed someone, but wasn't she just a lonely old lady who wanted someone to talk to? Hadn't she needed him too?

Paul reached down and fisted a hand in Sam's shirt, dragging him up the wall. _Didn't she need him now?_

"She's mine," Paul's ethereal voice echoed around the room. He threw Sam to the side as if he weighed nothing and turned back to Gloria, but this time she was ready, hurling a handful of salt right into his face. He flickered from existence.

"Sam!" she called breathlessly but he was already getting to his feet, bracing himself with one hand on the frame of the archway, his other hand held to his chest.

"I'm okay. Nice work with the salt."

Gloria offered a small smile that she knew was fueled by hysteria. "I'm a fast learner."

What happened next happened so fast that Gloria had no time to shout a warning. Sam had no time to move. One second he was alone in the archway, the next Paul was behind him, grinning at Gloria as, in another movement too rapid to even see properly, he looped a belt over Sam's head and pulled it tight around his neck, then they were both falling back into the kitchen, out of Gloria's line of sight.

"Sam!" Her feet did a nervous dance at the edge of the salt line as she waited desperately for a reply that wasn't coming. Muffled thuds came from the kitchen and her eyes skittered around the room until they finally landed on Sam's shotgun.

Gloria hesitated. Sam had told her, in no uncertain terms, to stay inside the salt. Aside from that, there was a ghost out there intent on murdering her, a ghost of a man who had been terrifying enough when he was alive.

The sounds from the kitchen were fading and Gloria made up her mind. No way was she going to stand there helplessly while Sam was in trouble. She may be getting closer to her sixties than her forties and she may not be a professional ghost hunter but she cared about that boy as much as he apparently cared about her.

She stepped over the salt line, half-expecting Paul to appear out of thin air but he didn't. She dashed to the gun and picked it up, careful to keep it pointed away from her. It was heavier than she expected and more awkward to hold than she would have wished. She hoped the safety wasn't on because she had no idea what to do with it other than point and pull the trigger.

Her legs threatened to fold under her as a small voice in her head insisted that she was going the _wrong way, run for the hills!_ But she crept closer, trying to hold the gun the way she'd seen Sam and Dean, her heart pounding in her chest.

Sam and Paul were on the floor, surrounded by broken crockery, Sam's hands scrabbling at the belt around his neck. Paul's hands held it firmly in place as he knelt up behind Sam, whose struggles were becoming uncoordinated, blue beginning to tinge his lips.

"Paul," Gloria whispered.

Paul's eyes fixed on hers and the absolute cruelty and hatred in them staggered her for a moment. She shook it off, leveling him with a glare of her own.

"Eat rock salt, you bastard," she managed to utter through her suddenly dry throat, and she pulled the trigger.

The force of the shot rocked her back a few steps, the gun's kickback hitting her shoulder hard, but Paul's ghastly image vanished. She ran to Sam's side and dropped down next to him, amongst the shattered plates, and helped him pull the belt away as he gasped and choked in fresh air.

"Oh God, Sam," she puffed as she ghosted her hands over him, looking for any other injuries, patting his back, "Oh God, are you okay? Sam?"

"Gun," Sam managed between coughs.

"What?"

"Gun!" Sam insisted, and his eyes flicked up over her shoulder.

Gloria gasped and spun on her knees. Paul was back, in the doorway. She crawled hastily forwards a few paces, cursing herself for dropping the weapon. Paul was advancing on her. She raised the gun and pulled the trigger but it was stuck. She pressed harder.

Still nothing.

Beginning to panic, she lowered the gun to inspect it. Maybe there was something else she had to press, maybe the safety clicked on automatically after each shot, maybe she needed to reload it...

Paul was almost on her. It was too late. The useless weapon dropped from Gloria's shaking hands, as she thought how ridiculously ironic it was that her last regret in life was going to be that she'd never learnt how to use a gun. She'd been on marches when she was young and determined to make a difference in the world, for tougher laws on the sale of firearms, to end war, to protest any kind of combat that involved any kind of weapon.

Gloria knelt on the floor and looked up into the face of her dead ex-husband and prepared herself. He had found her, and a part of her had always known he would. Hadn't she spent all these years hiding from him? Going to work and coming home to watch her soaps and hardly ever going out? Even after death and all the years that followed, she had been waiting for him to come for her.

He stared down at her in cold satisfaction, and then... and then...

And then he burst into flames, burning from the ground up in a sudden flash of bright white fire and in mere seconds he was gone, without even smoke left in his place.

The room warmed up. She heard soft voices from the TV in the other room and the dark oppressive atmosphere dispersed. Sam made her jump as his hand suddenly appeared to help her up and, after her mini-heart attack was over, she took it gratefully and let him pull her to her feet.

Sam grinned at her ruefully. "And you thought you'd be no good as back-up."

XXX

The boys stayed for another two days.

"To make sure Paul stays gone," Sam said, but Gloria could tell that it was an excuse more than anything. They weren't expecting him to come back.

Dean had arrived back at the house in the early hours of the morning, covered in grave dirt – Gloria decided that she just wasn't ever going to think about that – surveyed the damage to the house and to her and Sam (she had a small bump on her forehead and her shoulder was stiff, while Sam's hand and neck had bruised spectacularly) and, while she saw the struggle on Dean's face as he took in Sam's injuries and the resigned expression on Sam's, Dean managed to restrain himself to a quick, "You guys alright?"

Sam looked so stunned by the lack of smothering that Gloria felt the need to answer for the both of them.

"Nothing that a stiff drink wont fix."

This time both brothers looked at her in surprise. Gloria laughed like she hadn't in a long time and went to fetch the bourbon that had been sitting in her cupboard for almost a year.

The next day, whilst Sam was in the shower, Gloria made her way to the kitchen (which had miraculously tidied itself, along with the lounge, while she slept, or so Sam and Dean seemed to want her to think, what with all their blushing and embarassed stammering) where Dean was making coffee, again. Both boys seemed to be addicted to the stuff. She supposed it was neccessary in their profession.

"So," she said nonchalantly, "You and Sam sorted out your issue?"

"What issue?" Dean dodged, his back to her.

"I seem to remember something about Sam's head falling apart if you left him alone," Gloria teased lightly.

Dean took his coffee over to the table and surprised Gloria with a cup of tea for her. She smiled her thanks.

"Yeah, well..." Dean glanced at her, "Maybe I was being a bit over the top."

Gloria raised an eyebrow.

"Okay, so I kinda overheard you and Sam talking. I didn't realise I was making him feel so..."

"Incompentent?" Gloria suggested.

"Uh, yeah, I guess that works." Dean rubbed the back of his neck. "It's just... I practically raised him, you know? When I thought he was gone... I can't do that again."

"All parents know when it's time to let their kids stand on their own two feet, Dean."

"All parents don't take their kids to hunt monsters."

Gloria sipped her tea. It wasn't quite sweet enough but bless the boy for trying. "Well, it seems to me that you've got two options."

Dean looked up at her, "What's that?"

"You can either quit hunting-" she saw the doubt on Dean's face "-or you can start trusting Sam."

"I do trust Sam," Dean said defensively.

"You could try showing it sometimes," Sam said from the doorway, hair wet from the shower, dressed in socks, jeans and a t-shirt.

Gloria left them alone to talk.

The boys loaded up their Impala on the morning of the third day without Paul, and Gloria hugged them both goodbye.

Sam whispered a thanks in her ear that made her think that their conversation had gone well. She hoped so.

"Don't be strangers," she said, and she meant it, "There doesn't have to be a ghost for you to stop by and say hi."

The boys both muttered things about how the job was demanding and they didn't know where they'd be in a few months and they'd try to stop by sometime later.

Gloria watched them drive away and wondered if she'd ever see them again, and that night, like many nights to come, though she wasn't really a religious person, she sent up a prayer, hoping that someone up there was watching over her boys.

**End**

**A/N: I was going to say that I'm taking a break from fanfiction while I finish the first draft of my novel, but I've already started another story (I just can't help myself) so, maybe not so much of a break, but a slowing down. Just for a wee while.**

**Please tell me what you thought. I have a few more ideas so, if people are willing to have her, this might not be the last we see of Gloria. :) Thanks for reading!**


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